How Le Guess Who is pushing the boundaries of music even further in 2025
Lead photo: Smerz
Over four days this week the sprawling medieval city of Utrecht will become a haven for exploring new music as beloved festival Le Guess Who? will turn beloved venues and cultural centres into spaces for platforming fresh, underrepresented sounds that endeavour to push creative boundaries.
Honouring the motto “Listening is the Way Forward” for over twenty years, Le Guess Who? has established itself as one of Europe’s most forward-thinking showcases. This can, in part, be attributed to the festival's curatorial format. Every year, Le Guess Who? selects guest curators to help shape the line-up by choosing artists who influence their own work, resulting in a diverse mix of both emerging and established acts. Previous guest curators throughout the years have included Ty Segall, Perfume Genius, Shabaka Hutchings, and Animal Collective.
This year’s curatorial vision is led by musician and activist Amirtha Kidambi and her interpretation of “Outernationalism” titled Outernational, a concept introduced by late composer Ryuichi Sakamoto to encourage the dissolution of creative, spiritual, and political borders, fostering genuine connection by exploring human relationships outside of capitalism and nation-states. The belief that music can transcend national borders in favour of global cultural solidarity provides a thematic anchor for the 2025 edition of Le Guess Who?
Alongside Kidambi are South African drummer and percussionist Asher Gamedze, Berlin-based Colombian DJ and producer Edna Martinez, Hong Kong producer gyrofield, musician and visual artist Lonnie Holley, visionary contemporary artist Tianzhuo Chen, and drummer and composer Valentina Magaletti. Each guest brings a unique contribution, whether it be Gamedze’s program around Cape Town’s progressive music scene, Martinez’s introduction into Colombian sound system culture (PICÓ), or Chen’s immersive incorporation of ancient tradition through music, performance art, and audiovisual installations.
This year, Le Guess Who? has also announced the first edition of their Sound & Culture Summit, a program intended to facilitate knowledge exchange across subjects ranging from music curation and sound engineering to global accessibility and cultural policy. The Sound & Culture Summit will take place on Friday, 7 November at Stadsschouwburg Utrecht, and it is free and accessible to everyone. Some of the talks to be hosted include On Sound as Substance: Indigenous Approaches to Sound/Sound as Medicine, Community Organising in (Queer) Disasporic Contexts, and How To Make Noise: Tactics of Resistance Around the World.
Aligning with the festival’s core ethos of discovery, each day will feature a surprise performance on one of the main stages, encouraging attendees to ask themselves: “How much do you need to know something to enjoy it?” Beyond the musical element of the festival, Le Guess Who? will also be offering a film program, which will feature Lonnie Holley’s short film on the Black American experience, I Snuck Off The Slave Ship (with a Q&A to follow), Anisia Uzyman’s sci-fi punk musical Neptune Frost, and Garin Nugroho’s cine-concert Samsara.
Among a range of exhibitions to take place throughout the festival, Le Guess Who? will open tomorrow (6 November) with Wael Shawky’s Drama 1882, a work which depicts the nationalist Urabi Revolution as an opera performed in Arabic.
Here are our highlights that reflect Le Guess Who?’s “outernationalist” core, and the festival’s mission to build cultural bridges and celebrate boundary-crossing music.
SUNN O)))
Unearthing layers of drone, noise, and doom, within an eerie fog-dense atmosphere, American drone metal duo sunn O))) will be continuing their return to live form – over two decades since their formation. Just last month, the pair announced their signing to Seattle’s Sub Pop records, and released a surprise three-track EP, Eternity’s Pillars b/w Raise the Chalice & Reverential. The first night of Le Guess Who? Will see sunn o))) perform at TivoliVredenburg’s Ronda hall, pushing the constraints of sound by drawing parallels between metal and jazz composition, embodying Le Guess Who?’s aim to compel critical thought around how music is known and understood.
SUNN O))) perform on 6 November at 22:15 in the Ronda - TivoliVredenburg
Tomo Katsurada
Known as the founder and lead vocalist of Japanese psychedelic band Kikagaku Moyo, Tomo Katsurada will be bringing his solo project to Museum Speelklok at Le Guess Who?. Katsurada released his first EP, Dream of the Egg, just one year ago – the first of a series of five albums to soundtrack a picture book. Stripping back the psych-rock sound he came to be associated with as part of Kikagaku Moyo, Katsurada is embracing an ambient, multi-instrumental approach to psychedelic music that includes electric guitar, cello, and gentle vocals, creating a mystical and all-encompassing ambiance.
Tomo Katsurada performs on 7 November at 17:45 in Museum Speelklok
Ancient Indigenous Africans
Ancient Indigenous Africans is the collaboration between producer Mutamassik, and vocalist/narrator Lengai Loita. The duo released their eponymous debut EP last year, with their music chronicling fables addressing the struggles faced by the Maasai people. Loita sings in Maa – his mother tongue – alongside Mutamassik’s pliable synth rhythms that can land anywhere from hip-hop inspired sounds to junglist punk. “There would be no Egyptian Civilization without the Nile River. “There would be no Nile River without Lake Victoria, Tanzania (East Africa). There would be no Egyptians without Tanzanians. And yet, there is hardly any sense of familyhood. A.i.A. is the cure,” is the statement of Ancient Indigenous Africans, who will be joining the Le Guess Who? lineup as part of Valentina Magaletti’s curation.
Ancient Indigenous Africans performs on 7 November at 18:45 in Cloud Nine - TivoliVredenburg
Caxtrinho
Challenging preconceptions of samba music, Rio De Janeiro-born guitarist and composer Caxtrinho expands upon the sound through Afro-Brazilian influence and psychedelic textures. Following the release of his debut studio album Queda Livre last year, Caxtrinho will be performing two sets at Le Guess Who?, bringing his socially-charged bossa rhythms to LE:EEN’s creative space, NEEL on Saturday night, and TivoliVredenburg’s Cloud Nine hall on Sunday evening. Caxtrinho’s arrangements carry a curious, distorted inflection which brings a shadowy atmosphere to the warmth and lightness, honouring traditional expressions of black consciousness and fusion music within the Brazilian diaspora.
Caxtrinho perfoms on 8 November at 22:00 in NEEL - LE:EN, and on 9 November at 16:45 in Cloud Nine - TivoliVredenburg
Jabu
Bristol-based trio Jabu perform much like piecing together a scrapbook — bringing dubbed and alternate versions of their work to the stage, in addition to works in progress or sketches. Drawing inspiration from shoegaze, soul, and UK underground music, their set promises a collage of unpredictable sounds that are explored across a number of mixtapes and singles, in addition to their three albums, the most recent being A Soft and Gatherable Star released last month. Le Guess Who? offers an exploratory space for Jabu to expand on their nocturnal palette, engaging listeners with hazy, improvisational sounds.
Jabu perform on 8 November at 17:15 in De Helling
Smerz
Norwegian electronic duo Smerz derive their name from the German word "herzschmerz”, which means "heartache", but their music suggests anything but. Their unapologetic storytelling comes with a sense of cheeky confidence over DIY pop and computer music-inspired beats, bringing a digital, late-night edge to the final day of Le Guess Who? Their appearance follows the release of their album Big city life earlier this year, and is just one glimpse into the diversity of electronic acts to be platformed at this year’s edition of the festival.
Smerz performs on 9 Novembr at 18:30 in Ronda - TivoliVredenburg
Le Guess Who? runs from 6-9 November 2025; find out more at leguesswho.com
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